


The Mystery of You

by influorescence



Series: The Mystery of You [1]
Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Canon-Typical Mentions of Suicide, Developing Friendships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Family Feels, Family Fluff, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, Prom, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-14 18:53:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 16,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29546820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/influorescence/pseuds/influorescence
Summary: Long-form title: In Which An Uptight Church Girl Who May or May Not Be in a Cult and a Dummy Thicc Martial Arts Girl-Himbo Endure The Trials Of High School, Become Friends in Spite of Themselves, and Maybe Fall In Love Along The Way; They Are Accosted in Turn by Terrible Villains, Embarrassing Friends, Loving Families, and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Perceived; Contains Outdated Memes, Useless Lesbians, Brief Illness, Religion, and Bland Food.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Series: The Mystery of You [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2170755
Comments: 186
Kudos: 139





	1. Senior Year

Against all odds, Gideon Nav has made it to senior year relatively unscathed. Her grades are acceptable, some better than acceptable, and she’s only been in detention a handful of times. The impending drudgery of college applications aside, the worst of high school is over, and she has a solid plan of attack for the next ten months: scrape by in her classes, hang out with her favorite people, and generally bask in the springtime of her youth. She’s got a backpack full of school stuff, an inbox full of invites, and a head full of empty.

Gideon has a feeling it’s going to be a good year.

She thinks nothing of it when she takes her assigned seat in her first-period history class next to a tiny girl she’s never seen before. Despite her impeccable posture, the girl appears to shrink into her baggy layers of turtleneck and sweaters and floor-length skirt. She also seems to despise Gideon on sight, returning her attempts at conversation with one-word answers and a curl to her lip. 

Oh, well. Can’t win ’em all. 

She thinks a little more of it when she finds herself sitting next to the same girl in English, and again in biology. There’s a slight reprieve when they end up across the room from each other in their fourth period, but they are thrown back together in their next two classes. 

As sixth period nears its end, people start fidgeting with their backpacks while the teacher tries in vain to recapture their attention. In a fit of desperation, Gideon makes one final attempt at befriending her new school-assigned life partner. “What do you have for seventh period?”

She is leveled with a glare more formidable than should be possible from someone that small. “Independent study.”

“Oh, cool, me too!” At least there’s no chance that they share this. Gideon goes off-campus, and she definitely would have noticed someone new at her dojo, particularly if they attempted to pick up a _shinai_ and immediately toppled over. This is the only plausible way such a scenario could go. “I do kendo, what about you?”

“Religious studies,” the girl bites out.

Her name is Harrowhark Nonagesimus, and Gideon has a feeling it’s going to be a very long year.

* * *

Harrowhark is new, and as with anything even remotely novel in the microcosm of high school, rumors swirl. 

“I heard she’s in a cult,” says Coronabeth, plopping herself down on the plastic-coated bench in a manner that is somehow both ungainly and effortlessly elegant. “And when people found out, she had to switch schools.” Her sister sits beside her with considerably more grace, and Corona begins playing with the limp silk of her hair. 

_“I_ heard she _started_ a cult,” drones Ianthe in that disdainful way of hers. As usual, she entertains no delusions that she wants to be here. She and Gideon are the furthest thing from bosom buddies, but Corona is their year’s resident socialite, and where Corona goes, Ianthe goes. “If true, I call dibs.”

“What, on joining her cult?” says Gideon.

“On asking her out,” Ianthe shoots back. “She’s kind of attractive, in a shriveled, Mennonite way.”

“Gross.”

“You’re gross.”

“I heard she got expelled from her last school,” says Jeannemary emphatically, leaning forward against the grubby lunch table. “For being a _witch.”_

_“I thought witches were supposed to wear black, though?”_

_“Be_ quiet, _Isaac, don’t make me look dumb in front of Gideon—”_

 _“_ I heard you all should shut the hell up and leave the girl alone,” says Camilla mildly. Beside her, Palamedes turns a page, blatantly ignoring them all.

“I just want to know what her deal is,” Gideon definitely does not whine. “She’s in literally all of my classes, so I have to spend this whole year sitting next to her, and it’s like she hated me at first sight.”

“Well, we know she has good judgement,” Ianthe says. Gideon flips her off.

* * *

Whatever Harrowhark Nonagesimus’s deal, she quickly earns the respect of her fellow students. While Gideon studied the blade, Harrowhark apparently studied everything else, because she rockets to the top of their class rankings, neck and neck with Pal, who is gracious about it, and Silas Octakiseron, who is less so. 

This confounds some people, mostly Silas, but it makes perfect sense to Gideon—Harrowhark doesn’t seem to do anything besides study and, what, go to church? Gideon tries, once or twice, to ask about the details of her independent study course, but she is even more close-mouthed than usual about it, as if the perpetually tense line of her lips could be any more of a pursed butthole. Maybe she kills two birds with one stone and studies at church. Or maybe she sacrifices babies for grades. It could really go either way.

The combination of her formidable intellect and her general fuck-off aura means that she’s left well enough alone by the clowns who might usually try something as dumb as pick on her—or so Gideon assumes, until she forgets something in her locker one day before class and circles back to find a scene out of some terrible coming-of-age movie.

Down the hall, several classrooms past her locker, someone is crowding Harrowhark up against a bank of lockers. Harrowhark is leaning back with her arms folded, sullen and spiteful, looking like nothing so much as a beige-and-pastel snapping turtle. The clown in question turns out to be Silas Octakiseron, who is pointing a finger in her face in a way that is probably supposed to be menacing, but just makes him look even weedier and like more of a dweeb. Hovering at his shoulder is his gigantic wrestler nephew, who, to his credit, is averting his eyes from the entire mess with a look of mild abashment.

The whole situation is ridiculous and frankly embarrassing. Harrowhark doesn’t even look particularly threatened, which makes it all the more surprising when hot rage surges in Gideon’s chest and she finds herself stomping down the hall. 

“—family money of yours, not that that’s your real family legacy, we both know what I’m talking abou—”

“—your quarrel is with me; my family is none of your concern—”

“—that good, upright people should suffer a vile culti—”

“Hey!” shouts Gideon, causing both to jump. In their absorption, they had not noticed her until she was almost upon them. Now, she storms up to Silas. Colum merely watches, apathy replaced with barely detectable interest. “I don’t know how you have beef with someone who’s been at this school for, like, ten seconds, but step off.”

“This does not concern you, Nav,” sneers Silas. “Before you play the gallant knight, you should know wh—”

“I see one asshole shoving his snotty nose into things that don’t concern him, and it isn’t Colum or Harrowhark,” Gideon retorts. “Just say you’re jealous of her evil genius brain and go.”

They stare each other down. Gideon can see the slippery cogs in his slimy brain turning, trying to decide if it’s worth the hassle to make his undoubtedly stupid point, when he abruptly turns on his heel and stalks away. “Come on, Asht,” he snaps, needlessly, as Colum lumbers after him. 

“I can handle myself,” Harrowhark says, glowering up at her. 

“Yeah, I know.” Why is Gideon so pissed off? “Sorry for butting in, I guess.”

An awkward silence stretches between them. Gideon shifts her weight and averts her gaze somewhere past Harrowhark’s shoulder. Does she walk away now, or what? She still hasn’t gone to her locker—

“Harrow,” says Harrowhark suddenly.

“What?”

“You’ve been calling me Harrowhark; you can just say Harrow.”

“Oh.” When Gideon looks at her again, the scrunch of her dark brows is less angry. Gideon can’t help smiling a little. “Okay. Harrow.”

Harrow gives a stiff nod and turns to collect her things from her open locker, and while that should be Gideon's cue to leave, they have the same class next, so why not just wait for her? The annoyance returns to Harrow's face as Gideon chatters at her, but she doesn't tell her to go away, and they walk into biology late together. Gideon promptly has to turn around and walk back out—she forgot to go to her own locker.


	2. Butthurt Bookstore Guy

“Hey, Harrow,” says Gideon absentmindedly, doodling swirls on the polished black surface of their table.

It’s becoming a common refrain, usually accompanied by some of Nav’s trademark nonsense. _Hey, Harrow, lookin’ cute this morning, my lady of polyester blend. Hey, Harrow, nice job wiping the floor with Octakiseron on the test, he looked even more like an angry Lemongrab than usual. Hey, Nonagesimus, the people need to know: is your favorite color khaki or beige?_

For her information, Harrow’s cardigans are cashmere; she would never stoop to something so base as _polyester blend_. She does not voice such witty comebacks aloud.

“Hey, Harrow,” says Gideon again. “So, since you have, like, a humongous Mojo Jojo galaxy brain, I’m guessing you’re ready for the anatomy final?”

They’ve just wrapped up a weeklong dissection—cats, for their similarity to human anatomy—and the assessment is Monday. The smell of formaldehyde still permeates the biology classrooms like a pungent air freshener, and students have been walking around reeking of it for the past five days. Harrow itched for a shower immediately after stepping back into the stench each day, but her erstwhile table partner appeared not to notice it past her initial, obligatory commentary, reveling instead in getting to cut stuff up in school and enthusiastically confusing feline kidneys for ovaries. 

“Yes,” Harrow replies. She could do with a quick review of the lab notes and a glance over the textbook, but for the most part, she feels she has a grasp of the subject. Having your hands in the source material’s chemically preserved corpse will do that to you.

“D’you think you can help me study after school?”

This brings Harrow up short. 

She has, to her own confoundment, helped Gideon out here and there in their classes. She could say no, and she’s often inclined, particularly when Gideon is frantically attempting to complete an assignment as the teacher is walking toward them to collect it, but for whatever reason, she doesn’t. This has not, thus far, extended outside of the six hours a day they are mandated to spend in each other’s grudging company.

“I mean, you don’t have to,” Gideon is saying, having interpreted her surprised silence as reluctance. “Or if you’re busy with church stuff, we can do it after.”

“… Fine. Where do you propose we meet?”

“Can’t do it at my house, sorry,” Gideon says hastily. “Um …”

“Nor mine,” says Harrow, before Gideon can suggest it.

“Should we go to the bookstore down the street? They have a coffee shop inside with tables, but you might have to buy something, or the old guy working there gets really butthurt.”

Oh, how the English language is poorer for Gideon knowing it. “That’s fine. We can meet at four o’clock. Don’t be late.”

“Okay! I won’t, thanks, Harrow.” Gideon beams crookedly at her. She gives a grunt of acknowledgement and starts putting away her notes.

* * *

Gideon is late. 

She comes pelting around the corner at thirteen minutes past, sweating and huffing out apologies. “Class ran long—Magnus asked me to help clean up—sorry—you could’ve gone in and ordered first—”

Harrow had not thought of this. She smooths her fingers over her long skirt and stands from the metal bench. “No matter. Let’s go.”

Gideon holds the door open and she walks through, into the smell of coffee and new books. Quiet muzak plays from speakers hidden somewhere in the high ceiling. The light is pleasantly warm, sunlight streaming through ceiling-height windows to mix with the incandescent glow of brass pendant lamps. Past several displays of bestsellers, the cafe sits in the center of the store, demarcated by a rectangle of waist-high railings covered in plastic foliage. It’s sparsely populated, the only other customers a group of younger students poring over their textbooks with earbuds in and someone in the corner tapping away at their laptop. 

They’ve barely set down their bags when a man with a carved-in frown and salt-and-pepper hair is upon them. “Sorry,” he says in tones that suggest otherwise, “But you can’t sit here unless you buy something—”

 _Butthurt,_ Gideon mouths at her from behind the man’s shoulder, and against her will, Harrow feels a tickle of amusement. Out loud, Gideon says, “We were about to, sir, just wanted to put our stuff down first.” 

At the counter, Gideon orders some horrifying concoction of whipped cream and caramel and chocolate syrup that is related only in name to the idea of coffee. “What are you getting? My treat, since I was late and you’re helping me and all.”

For the second time today, she catches Harrow off guard. “I’ve never been to one of these,” she says, surprise yanking the truth from her. 

To her relief, Gideon doesn’t jibe at her for it, merely raising her eyebrows. “Do you like coffee?” 

“I don’t know. I’ve never had it.” 

The eyebrows creep upward, but still no teasing. “Okay,” she says, turning back to Butthurt Bookstore Guy. “One small iced coffee, please.”

Toll paid, they settle into their studying. Harrow finds that the coffee is not too overwhelming, and pleasantly cool besides. Gideon, it turns out, has significantly less difficulty with labeled diagrams of the dissection than the real thing, and Harrow is able to help her match the illustrations to the cell phone photos she took during lab (“my followers want _content,”_ she’d declared). 

This is typical of Gideon, really. She’s not stupid, just eternally misdirected. And since when did Harrow know what was _typical_ for Gideon Nav, anyway?

Gideon has some kind of sixth sense for Harrow’s levels of discomfort, and never balks at the chance to raise them. “Hey, Harrow.”

She quirks an eyebrow and doesn’t bother taking her eyes off her notes.

“How far are you on your college applications?”

This makes her look up. “Putting on the finishing touches. They’re due very soon, Nav.”

“I know,” says Gideon fretfully. “I need someone to look over my personal essay, and I figured—you’re good at untangling my brain, so if it’s not asking too much—”

She is about to know even more about Gideon Nav, apparently. The universe is laughing at her.

Harrow heaves a sigh, more at herself than anything else. “Fine. I’ll do it. Do you have it with you?”

“Ah, before I show you, I, um …”

Harrow waits her out. She’s learned it’s easier just to let Gideon babble herself back to the point. 

“I’m a foster kid.”

Whatever Harrow was expecting, it wasn’t that.

“That’s what my essay’s about, being in the system and all that. I didn’t know who I could show it to.… Like, I trust Cam and Sex Pal a lot, but I guess I didn’t want them to look at me differently? And you already kinda hate everyone, or don’t care about them or whatever, so I didn’t think you would.” Gideon pauses for breath and takes a loud slurp at the dregs of her noxious beverage. 

“You flatter me,” says Harrow drily. 

“That’s why we couldn’t just do this at my house,” Gideon continues. “I love my foster parents, they’re great, they’re so nice to me—Magnus and Abigail, my kendo teacher and his wife, she’s a librarian—and they say they always wanted kids, but I’m pretty sure they meant a cute baby or a little kid or something, and they got me instead, and I—don’t want to step on any toes, you know? So I try not to bother them too much, so they don’t trade me in for a nicer model, which would be pretty dumb of them, I mean, have you seen these guns—”

Despite herself, watching Gideon flex her admittedly large biceps, Harrow feels something akin to sympathy. 

“Stop that ridiculous posturing. I already said I would read it, and I’ll continue to see you for what you are—an imbecile and a drain on my time and patience.” She winces a little inside, the words coming out harsher than she intended, but Gideon merely grins at her.

“See, I knew I could trust you.”

Like she said—an imbecile.

  
  



	3. Nerd Ghost

Gideon has spent half her waking hours for the past few months with Harrowhark Nonagesimus, yet she continues to be a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. She has breathed not a word about her hobbies or interests, if she has any, or indeed given a single indication that she is anything other than a particularly sullen NPC. Gideon’s not even sure if she requires food, like humans tend to do; if she does, Gideon has not observed it. Harrow vanishes after fifth period for the duration of their lunch break, returning just as mysteriously at the start of sixth.

“Maybe she’s a ghost,” remarks Gideon one afternoon. “The wrathful spirit of some huge nerd who died of burnout. She can only be conjured with a summoning circle of notes, tests, and student tears.”

“Maybe she goes off campus so she doesn’t have to listen to your bullshit,” Camilla snarks back. “If you talk at her as much as you talk about her, it’s no wonder.”

“Love you, too, Cam.”

Without the slightest change in her bored expression, Camilla puckers her lips and blows her a sarcastic kiss.

“Why don’t you ask if she wants to have lunch with us?” says Palamedes. “We wouldn’t mind, would we, Cam?”

She shrugs, indifferent to this as she is to most things that do not involve kicking someone’s ass, in MMA or otherwise. Clearly considering the matter settled, Pal returns to his book. It’s an absurd idea, but try as Gideon might, she can’t think of a reason not to.

The next day, as the class puts away their things and stares at the clock, willing the bell to ring, Gideon pops the question.

“Hey, Nonagesimus, where do you even go during lunch?”

“None of your business,” says Harrow automatically.

“Cool, cool, cool. I was thinking,” Gideon plows on, “if you want, you can eat lunch with me and my friends? Sex Pal and Camilla, you know them, they’re in some of our classes, and some other people. I mean, if you even eat food, I’ve never seen you do it, but studies show that most humans eat food, with the exception of Spiders Georg, who—”

More to shut her up than anything else, probably, and with a face like she’s signing her own order of execution, Harrow agrees.

That’s how Harrow ends up joining them for lunch most days, always perched at the farthest corner of the table, but there nonetheless. It turns out she does, in fact, consume human food: usually some variation on white rice, limp vegetables, and greyish meat that is an affront to the storied history of spices, but is, at least, not spiders.

Surprisingly, or perhaps not, Harrow and Palamedes get on like a house on fire—which is to say, they largely ignore each other in favor of burying their noses in their respective books, occasionally breaking into spirited debates about some nerd shit or other. They’re very alike, now that Gideon sees them in close proximity. They share an air of being perpetually undernourished and a pallor that suggests too much time indoors, warmth sucked from them by fluorescent lights.

Harrow gets along with everyone else as well as she’s capable of, which consists mainly of staring with mild contempt as they carry on, when she’s not checked out altogether. This, Gideon decides, must be the Harrowhark Nonagesimus equivalent of enjoying the company of people. It’s probably hard being a cult leader-slash-witch-slash-nerd ghost who may or may not sacrifice babies. It’s hard and nobody understands.

* * *

Gideon’s lunch crew is a rotating cast of characters. Cam and Pal are usually there, unless they’re off in the library. They share custody of Jeannemary and Isaac with the theater kids. Coronabeth drops by on occasion, along with Ianthe, to Gideon’s displeasure, and sometimes Naberius, to her utter revulsion (Harrow tends to revisit her disappearing act when _Babs_ is around). And, unexpectedly, a familiar face makes a long-awaited reappearance.

Gideon is blabbering away at Harrow’s side as they meander toward their table, met predominantly with silence, when she spots someone with a head of bobbed, caramel-colored hair engaged in conversation with Pal. He’s leaning so far across the table, he looks like he’s about to fall over.

“Dulcie!” Gideon shouts, running the rest of the way. Dulcinea is feather-light in her arms as Gideon scoops her into a careful hug. She looks wan, thinner than the last time Gideon saw her, but her smile is bright and sets all of the old butterflies aflutter in Gideon’s chest.

The feeling is not exclusive—one glance at Palamedes, and she can practically read the thoughts off his normally stoic face, inscribed with adoration as only Dulcinea can inspire. Gideon knows he visited her every day she was in the hospital, brought her assignments and books until she was too ill to work and fell far enough behind that she had to repeat her senior year with their cohort. She also knows that after school, he takes classes into the evening at the local university—spent his summer breaks at the community college to fulfill their high school’s science requirements, and leaves after lunch to study genomics and cancer biology and biochemistry, anything that could one day make a dent in the recurrences of Dulcie’s aggressive leukemia.

In short, she knows as well as anyone that Palamedes loves Dulcinea: selflessly, wholeheartedly, incorruptibly. Though he would never expect anything in return, Gideon suspects there’s something there for Dulcie, too—which means hellfire will raze the earth before she, or anyone else, gets in the way of that.

“Gideon,” breathes Dulcinea, eyes crinkling at her. “It’s wonderful to see you. And who might this be?”

At this, Gideon remembers Harrow, who is lurking at the far end of the table like a disgruntled marshmallow Peep. She introduces them, and makes a minimum of effort to conceal her amusement at Harrow’s bewildered response to Dulcie’s gushing.

“So,” Dulcie says as they sit down. “What have I missed? I saw all the posters for the winter formal dance, are you going?”

“Nah,” Gideon says. “College apps really put a dent in my bank account, and with the holidays, I’m not getting as many hours at the dojo.” Not that she’s complaining, she feels bad even taking a paycheck after everything Magnus and Abigail have done for her, but they insisted—something about not being ridiculous, and also child labor laws. Anyway, it’s better to save what she has, put it toward exam and graduation fees at the end of the year—and, of course, prom.

“Oh, that’s too bad.” Dulcie lays a fragile hand on her arm. Gideon would go to war for her. “And what about you, Harrow?”

In the face of such uncomplicated sincerity, Harrow is less snappish than she might normally be. “No, I ca—no. No, I’m not going.”

Dulcie doesn’t pry, smiling and saying brightly, “Well, I am!” Harrow’s shoulders relax minutely.

“Oh, yeah?” Gideon exclaims, and she knows before she turns to look at him. Pal has gotten a book out and is staring fixedly at one spot, but there’s a faint blush to his cheeks and a hint of a smile. She crows and claps him so hard on the back he almost plunges face-first into the pages. Beside him, Camilla snorts into her food.

* * *

A few afternoons after Dulcie’s return to school, it turns out that wasn’t the last of the winter formal business. Gideon slams her locker shut and starts in Harrow’s direction, intending to grab her so they can walk to lunch together, before she realizes that Harrow is talking to someone. It’s Ianthe, looming over her like a hostile inflatable tube man.

Man, she really thought the hassling would stop after word spread about Silas. How it got around, she has no idea. She hadn’t wanted to encourage rumors about Harrow, who doesn’t willingly talk to people; Silas surely wouldn’t spread the news of his own thorough dunking; and there’s a sixty-five-percent chance that Colum’s mouth has actually been sewn shut, for all that she’s heard him speak. The hallway had been empty aside from the four of them, but that’s high school for you: gossip seeps from the very walls.

She hangs back a little this time. The urge to interfere is making her twitchy, but she doesn’t want to barge in again and annoy Harrow, who seems to have a handle on the situation. After a minute, Ianthe shrugs, flips her lank hair over her shoulder, and walks away.

Gideon resists the desire to rush over, ambling toward Harrow in a way that’s meant to be supes casual, but probably looks more like she has rocks in her shoes. Harrow meets her in the middle. Mild surprise lingers on her face.

Without prompting, she says, “Ianthe just asked me to winter formal.”

So, it wasn’t a piss-poor attempt at bullying, after all. Gideon should feel relieved, but the annoyance doesn’t go away. Ianthe is that repellant, she supposes. She inspires hatred just by existing.

“And? Are you going to the dance with Girl Snape?”

Harrow gives her a look. “I said no.”

There’s the relief. Good. Nobody, not even Harrow, should have to spend an evening outside of school with Ianthe Tridentarius.


	4. Rice Porridge

Harrow feels terrible.

This would not, in itself, be unusual. On a spiritual level, she feels varying levels of terrible most of the time, as she should, but this terrible extends into her physical being. Her head feels thick and heavy on her neck, she’s shivering despite her usual layers of sweaters and an additional coat and scarf, and her thoughts coagulate at the back of her head rather than rising, eager and sharp, when she summons them.

“You look terrible,” says Gideon, sliding into the seat beside her just as the bell rings. Harrow does not dignify this with an answer, because it does not deserve one, and also because it would take a lot of energy that she can’t seem to muster at the moment.

She can feel Gideon skirting around the boundaries of her vision to peer more closely at her face. “Seriously, you look terrible,” she says. There’s an edge to her voice.

“Leave me alone, Nav,” Harrow says, with some effort. It doesn’t have the force it should, but it doesn’t matter, because the teacher starts speaking and Gideon is forced to stop staring at her with those too-intense eyes. She continues to shoot her troubled looks every few minutes, but Harrow, preoccupied with the strain of existing, can’t be bothered telling her off just now.

By their midmorning break, Harrow is aware that she is teetering on the border of unreality. Everything is moving a bit too fast, and the table spins unhelpfully when she tries to sit down.

“Whoa,” says Gideon, putting a hand on her shoulder. She allows this trespass, because Gideon is reliably solid, while other things have recently and rudely decided to become liquid.

“Harrow, are you sick?” asks Jeannemary. “Maybe you caught the flu?”

“Lots of people in my classes are out with the flu,” Isaac chimes in. “You should go to the nurse, maybe they’ll let you go home.”

Something cool rests against her forehead, and she leans into it, but it’s gone too soon.

“Harrow, you’re burning up,” Camilla says. “Isaac is right, you should go home.”

“Or at least take some ibuprofen,” says Palamedes. “There’s some in my first aid kit.”

That’s a lot of people, saying a lot of words, when all Harrow can focus on is how she somehow feels stuffy and raw at the same time. “… going to take a nap,” she mutters, settling her aching head on the soft pillow of her arms.

The babble of voices is muffled to soothing ambient noise, but it feels like only a minute later when someone touches her shoulder again.

“Hey, Harrow,” someone is saying gently. “We have to go to class. Do you want me to take you to the nurse?”

Harrow makes an indistinct noise of dissent and tries to stand. It takes a while, her limbs uncooperative and her balance off. Her eyes are still blurry with sleep, and she blinks to make it go away, but it only worsens. Her field of vision is strangely small. She wobbles and hears someone shout, and then—

* * *

“—should have made her come earlier, but you can’t _make_ Harrowhark Nonagesimus do anything—”

“—be fine, young lady, sit down, the front office said you carried her here by yourself? You should have asked a teacher to call me, you didn’t hurt yourself, did you?”

“Yeah, right, with these guns? Look, she’s the one who’s sick, aren’t you supposed to be taking care of her?”

“Now, there’s no need for that tone. We’ve already called her parents, they’re on their way—”

“—Harrow?”

“… nn,” her mouth says.

“Hey, Harrow,” Gideon says, leaning over her. For some reason, despite how awful she feels, or maybe because of it, she wants to smile. Maybe she would, if her muscles would obey her.

“…’s going on?” Harrow mumbles, squinting against the harsh lights. She’s lying on some sort of upholstered vinyl surface and covered by a thin blanket. When she turns her head, a scratchy pillowcase crinkles loudly against her ear.

“You fainted.” says Gideon, her brows knitting together. “You’re in the nurse’s office, sorry, I know you didn’t want to come. You have a fever, your parents are coming to pick you up.”

Harrow flops one heavy arm up to grab her wrist. Gideon’s eyes widen.

“Thanks,” she thinks she says.

“Mmf,” says Gideon.

Someone, probably the nurse, attempts to tell Gideon she should be in class, and is quelled by her answering scowl. It’s quite an impressive scowl, Harrow thinks. Good scowl.… Good face.

She might be delirious.

Gideon sits with her as one minute bleeds into the next, sights and sounds swimming in and out of focus. Harrow feels at once like she is filled with stones and as if she is floating above her own body, skin prickling against the chill of the air conditioning. It’s possible she dozes off at some point.

Eventually, the phone rings like a siren into the quiet, and the nurse informs them that Harrow’s parent has arrived, hinting that _someone_ might want to go back to class if she doesn’t want detention. _Someone_ pulls a face when the nurse’s back is turned, and Harrow makes a painful noise somewhere between a laugh and a cough. Gideon turns those startled eyes on her again.

“Well, I, uh, gotta go,” she says, looking down. She makes no motion to leave. Harrow realizes she’s still holding her wrist, and she makes her hand let go. Gideon squeezes Harrow’s fingers and looks away, clearing her throat. “Get well soon, Nonagesimus.”

Then she’s standing and walking away, haloed by the morning sun as she pushes the door open. Her hair shines gold where the sunlight hits.

* * *

“I told you to stay home today,” Aiglamene says.

She was uncharacteristically sympathetic when she walked in on the pathetic sight of Harrow prone and wheezing in the nurse’s room. That evaporated as quickly as the cool cloth on Harrow’s forehead as soon as she was safe in her bed at home.

“Oh, don’t start again,” Harrow grumbles, and immediately regrets it. When she speaks, her voice feels like it will crack open. She takes the proffered pills and downs them with the glass of water; it's like ice, trickling down her scraped-up throat.

“The nurse said your friend carried you to the office? That Gideon kid you’re always talking about?”

“’m not _always talking about_ her,” she says feebly, and lets her head fall back to her pillow. The cool fabric is a balm against her fevered skin. “Dunno if she considers me a friend.”

“For such a smart girl, you can be pretty stupid,” she thinks she hears Aiglamene say, but she’s already half-asleep. There is a sigh, and a gentle hand presses to her head.

“Get some rest,” the voice murmurs, and Harrow does.

* * *

She spends several days convalescing, mostly sleeping, forcing down bowls of rice porridge in chicken broth, and trying not to heave said porridge back up. Two days in, she attempts to crawl out of her blanket cocoon for school, and is physically dragged back to bed when Aiglamene catches her kneeling, winded, against the doorframe of her closet.

“Trying to follow in your parents’ footsteps, fool child,” Aiglamene mutters angrily as she tucks Harrow back in, shoving the sheets around her with such vehemence, one would think they personally encouraged her to make a break for it.

By the weekend, she is, if not brand new with tags, at least refurbished. It takes some convincing, but Aiglamene grudgingly admits that she’s probably well enough to return to school on Monday.

“Drink plenty of water, eat _all_ of your lunch,” she rants as Harrow packs her backpack. “I’d better not see a crumb left in that tupperware. And be sure to tell that friend of yours thank you for saving your sorry ass.”

Right. That.

Since the return of her lucidity, she has spent most of her time trying not to think about how she arrived at the creaky cot in the nurse’s office. Gideon checking on her throughout the morning, Gideon steadying her as she sat, Gideon gently waking her. How Gideon would have caught her as she fell and carried her in those big arms all the way across campus.

“—face is red, has your fever returned?” Aiglamene is feeling her forehead. Harrow ducks away.

“I feel fine, Aiglamene, stop fussing,” she says in a rush. “Yes, yes, I’ll do all that. So I can return to school tomorrow, yes?”

“Stubborn creature,” Aiglamene grouses, chucking her under the chin, but she doesn’t say no.

The next morning, Harrow regrets, for the first time in her life, being perennially early. For how long must she sit in this terrible, hard seat, jittering for reasons she doesn’t entirely understand, until she can spit a hurried thank-you at that too-bright face and wipe the whole thing from her memory—

“Hey, Harrow!” says a voice from behind her, and she jolts and whips her head around. Gideon is hovering, tentative, behind her own chair, and her eyes are wide. The hesitation is at odds with the broad sweep of her shoulders, the strong, brown grip of her hands on the seat back as she leans against the chair. “I’m glad you’re back, it’s good to see you! Are you feeling okay?”

What was she thinking about, again?

“Yes, I’m all right,” Harrow says. Gideon is glad she’s back. Gideon thinks it’s good to see her. “Thank you. For—for what you did.”

“Oh, yeah, no worries.” Gideon breaks into a grin. There’s an air of sheepishness to it. She averts her eyes as she flops into her chair, thumping her bag unceremoniously on the desk.

Then, she starts spouting her familiar drivel. “I mean, it’s not like you’re the first delicate damsel to swoon in my presence, let’s be real, a girl gets used to it after a while. I really gotta start carrying around some smelling salts or something, for the sake of public health—”

The off-kilter world shifts back onto its axis. Harrow casts her eyes heavenward for patience and tunes her out as the bell sounds for the start of class.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _[Rice porridge (稀飯 xī fàn)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congee#China) _


	5. Peacocking

It’s not quite spring, yet, but the biting cold is beginning to abate, and flu cases have dwindled. As dreary weather and gloomy-eyed teens begin to perk back up, so too does the rigor of their classes.

In history, their teacher announces, with no small amount of schadenfreude, a group project.

“Groups of four or five, please!” chirps the teacher, bouncing a little in his glee. “If you don’t have a group, come see me!” He sounds a little too delighted at the prospect of inflicting his will upon stragglers, and everyone groups off with haste.

As luck would have it, Gideon and Harrow share this class with Dulcie, Cam, and Pal, and they hurry to sit together before any opportunists can swoop upon Palamedes or Harrow. Harrow’s aura of doom is no longer enough to scare off the more determined vultures hoping for scraps of her brilliance. Pal, on the other hand, is nice enough to just let it happen to him if no one intercedes.

It is immediately apparent that this is not a project that will be completed in one class period, or even the three they’ve been allotted. The rest, their teacher informs them with relish, must be finished outside of class.

“So we have to do school in school, and we have to do school outside of school, too?” Gideon complains.

“I see you are familiar with the concept of homework, Ms. Nav!” their teacher singsongs. Gideon does an about-take; she hadn’t noticed him walk behind her. Across their pushed-together desks, Camilla smirks. Gideon makes a face at her.

After ensuring he is out of earshot, she says under her breath, “Bold of you to assume I do homework outside of school.”

“Oh, I’m sure we all know the opposite to be true,” says Harrow, resting the sharp point of her chin on her palm. Gideon attempts to engage her in a staring contest, but Harrow only side-eyes her briefly before looking away.

They begin meeting at the bookstore after school, Pal skiving off of his college courses for what he claims is the sake of the group, but Gideon suspects is more about spending time with Dulcie. Not that she minds—the rest of them pull their weight, but he and Harrow are the obvious brains of the operation. While they confer about obscure factoids that definitely weren’t covered in class and probably aren’t even in the top-level Wikipedia articles, she, Cam, and Dulcie peruse said Wikipedia articles and do the bulk of the grunt work.

They usually call it around six o’clock, when Dulcinea begins to wane, and when they should be getting home for dinner anyway. One evening, Harrow says, “You all go ahead. I’ll stay and finish this section.”

“Are you sure?” Camilla says. “Sextus and I need to drop Dulcie off, but we can come back afterwards.”

“No, no, I’d like to help,” Dulcinea protests, teetering on her crutches. Cam puts a hand on her elbow to steady her, and Pal does the same on her other side.

“It’s fine.” Harrow chews her lip absentmindedly, eyes intent on her laptop. “I’ll lose my train of thought if I don’t finish this today. There’s no need for any of you to stay late.”

“I’ll stay,” Gideon offers. At this, Harrow looks up. “I can help Harrow. You guys get home.”

“Well, if you’re sure?” Palamedes says.

Gideon waves them off and sinks back into her chair. Harrow is still watching her, face impassive.

“How may I be of service, o somber abbess?”

Harrow snaps out of her reverie and turns back to her computer, shoving an open book at Gideon.

“See if you can find anything else on that,” she says, jabbing a finger at a highlighted portion. She resumes tapping away at her keyboard and Gideon slouches in her seat to page through the book.

One mind-numbing hour later, Harrow heaves a gusty sigh. “I think that should do it.” Gideon groans and tips her head back, lifting her arms and arching into a much-needed stretch. When she straightens up, tugging her shirt back down over her stomach, Harrow is watching her out of the corner of her eye. Her lips are slightly parted. It must be grating on her nerves to be spending this much time in Gideon’s spectacular, if admittedly noisy, company, but there’s no accounting for taste.

“Any plans for the evening?” Gideon croons. She leans her elbows on the table and flutters her eyelashes absurdly. She’s a little off-balance from sitting for so long, and the motion puts her closer to Harrow than she intended, but she plays it off. Harrow jerks back an inch and busies herself with packing her stuff. “Need a ride, my scholastic mistress?”

“I’ve already texted my _ride,”_ Harrow says. “It’ll be about fifteen minutes.” And before Gideon can come up with some other witticism, “Why do you do that?”

“What?”

“The—peacocking, all the flexing and stretching and batting your eyelashes—”

Gideon‘s eyebrows shoot up to her hairline. “I—what?”

“You know what I’m talking about. Making up weird nicknames, pretending to flirt with everyone—”

“Not everyone,” says Gideon, defensive for some reason she can’t discern, which makes her blurt, “and who’s pretending?”

Harrow’s mouth opens and closes. Gideon, in a tizzy of _now why the fuck would I say that,_ tries to walk the conversation back from total catastrophe, but they are rudely interrupted.

“Sorry,” says that blatantly un-sorry voice. “But to sit here, you have to buy someth—”

“We bought something!” Gideon gestures at the cluster of cups shoved to the edge of the table, empty save for some flecks of whipped cream. “Lots of somethings! There were five of us!”

“To sit here,” Butthurt Bookstore Guy says over her protests. “You have to buy something _every three hours,_ and you ladies have been here for quite a while.”

“We’re just leaving,” Harrow cuts in, before Gideon can retort further. She starts gathering up the empty cups. “Come on, Gideon, I’ll wait outside. You can go.”

“Don’t be stupid, it’s dark,” Gideon says back. “I’ll wait with you.”

Outside the bookstore, it is indeed dark, and chilly. Gideon watches Harrow shiver and has to resist the urge to do something ridiculous, like offer her her jacket, or huddle closer to her.

“I think we’re mostly done,” Gideon says awkwardly. “We can probably put everything together at lunch tomorrow, I don’t think we can come back here.” She gives a half-hearted laugh. Harrow is carefully avoiding her gaze and gripping her hands together, trying to warm them. Without thinking, Gideon reaches for them.

Harrow startles at the touch. The whites of her eyes stand out in the darkness as she finally looks at Gideon. Harrow’s fingers are so small in hers. She’s reminded of the last time she touched Harrow’s hand, looked into those same black eyes, glazed with fever.

“You’re cold,” she mumbles. She wraps both hands around Harrow’s, bringing them close to her face. Harrow’s breathing is shallow, her eyes on their joined hands and on Gideon’s lips, and Gideon feels the tremor that runs through her when she breathes on Harrow’s fingers to warm her up. “Don’t want you to get sick again.”

Harrow opens her mouth to say something, but they are interrupted again, this time by the piercing glare of headlights and the sound of a car approaching. She snatches her hands back and stuffs them in her coat pockets. “Thanks for waiting,” she says hastily, and trots off in the direction of the car. She turns to look at Gideon again as she climbs in, her small, pale face a flash against the evening sky, and then she’s gone.

* * *

“So, you got kicked out?” Magnus is laughing uproariously.

“Yes!” Gideon says, gesticulating with her fork. “I don’t know why Butthurt Bookstore Guy has to be so— _butthurt_ all the time!”

“Maybe it’s because he has to put up with rowdy teenagers day in and day out,” Abigail says wryly.

“We weren’t being rowdy,” Gideon whines. “I wish. All we’ve done this week is write the longest report you’ve ever seen. I never want to see another historical date in my life. Time is a human construct. I reject your reality and substitute my own.”

“Careful with that fork, you’ll put someone’s eye out.” Magnus, still chuckling, wipes away a tear. “Why don’t you do your project here? You never have your friends over, we’re starting to think you made them up.”

“I mean, we’re mostly done.” She stumbles over her words. “We’re probably just going to finish it at school tomorrow, we don’t have to go anywhere.”

“Well, that’s fine,” says Abigail gently. “But Gideon, dear … you know you can invite your friends over, right? This is your home.”

“Within reason, of course,” Magnus hastens to add. “Try not to throw any parties that get broken up by the police.”

Magnus and Abigail are watching her, carefully, and trying not to look like they’re watching, like she’s an animal that might spook. Maybe she is. Maybe she’s weary of spooking. Maybe she’s ready to come in, out of the cold.

She looks at their kind faces, takes a deep breath, and nods.

“I know.”

They eat in silence for a minute or two, save for the clinking of cutlery and the sounds of chewing. Eventually, Magnus says, “So … you’ve been spending quite a bit of time with this Harrow girl, huh?”

Gideon tries to ignore his waggling eyebrows. “Yeah, she’s in _every single one_ of my classes. Can’t live with her, can’t live without—no, yeah, that’s about right. Can’t live with her.”

“A little birdie told me you princess-carried her all the way across school the other day,” Abigail joins in, smiling.

“Where did you even—people talk too much, it wasn’t like that—”

“So you didn’t carry her like a bride, over hill and over dale, to the very threshold of the castle keep?” Those eyebrows are excessive, really, there is absolutely no need for eyebrows to ever move that much. “Is that why you were so tired before class a few weeks ago?”

“No, listen, she got sick, okay, she needed help.” She’s sweating. Is the thermostat stuck again? “What was I supposed to do, leave her to die?”

“Or call a teacher?” says Abigail, amused.

“What’s the point of having muscles like these if I don’t use them? Anyway, this is delicious, Abigail, can we all just take a minute to appreciate your food? It’s like we’re judges on MasterChef, in the second half of the season, obviously, after they’ve weeded out the weak ones.” She shoves an enormous forkful of lamb stew and rice in her mouth to ward off further interrogation.

“Is it that much better than when we had it last week?” Magnus’s eyes are twinkling, but thankfully, he lets the subject drop. Just in time, because Gideon was going to have to pretend to choke next, or actually choke, and that would have been less than pleasant for all involved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _  
> [Lamb stew (khoresh-e ghormeh sabzi)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghormeh_sabzi)  
>  _


	6. The Librarian

Their report is complete and their group, to nobody's surprise, earns top marks. With her class rank defended and the project group dispersed, Harrow returns to her regular schedule. 

The public library down the street is rarely busy when she arrives for her independent study period. Weekday afternoons typically mean one or two gaggles of parents with small children and the odd senior citizen hunched at a computer carrell, plus a few library employees. By the time people her age start to show up, about twenty minutes after the end of the regular school day, she has tidied her books and left for home. This suits Harrow more than fine; she prefers to keep this particular course of scholarship close to her chest.

The library’s main desk, a heavy semicircle of polished, dark wood closed off by a wall of carts and low bookcases, is situated directly in front of the entrance. This, combined with her clockwork schedule, means that despite taking great pains to slink unnoticed to and from her preferred study corner, she has become a familiar face to the staff. Sometimes, they horrify her by greeting her. Today presents one such unhappy encounter.

“Good afternoon, Harrowhark!” a voice chirps at her.

If only automatic doors could automate a little more _quietly._

“We received one of your holds.” The librarian smiles at her from behind the circulation desk. “Let me grab it for you.” 

Harrow resists the urge to fidget as she watches the woman run her finger over the books on the shelf behind her to retrieve one tagged _Nonagesimus, H._

“Doing a research project?” the librarian says conversationally as she clicks around her computer screen. 

“Final presentation,” Harrow replies stiffly. The barcode scanner beeps. The woman hums in acknowledgement and looks up as she passes the book to Harrow.

“I hope you don’t mind me saying,” the librarian says slowly, looking at her. “You remind me a little bit of my daughter. You both seem … tense, every time I see you. On edge. And I may not know you as well, but my daughter, she’s a good girl who has no reason to feel that way, and I think you are, too.”

Harrow is silent. 

The librarian continues. “I couldn’t help but notice that your books tend to focus on … shall we say, the darker sides of faith and humanity. Could I impose on you by recommending something a little more hopeful?”

Harrow watches with wary eyes as the librarian stoops to grab something. When she straightens back up, she’s holding another book. She slides it across the counter. As Harrow touches it, a bolt runs up her spine. Her skin prickles with sudden goosebumps, and the hair stands up on her arms.

The solemn face of a woman stares out from the plastic-coated cover: steely-eyed, with a firm set to her jaw and a quirk to her lips that could read as amusement. It is the face of someone who has seen and done things that she should not have, lived to tell the tale, and does not know quite how to feel about it.

IN HIS EYES

A Story of Survival 

By Pyrrha Dve

The book is already slipping from Harrow’s trembling fingers before she finishes reading the cover. It hits the desk with a smack as she trips backwards, trying to get away from it, from the librarian, who is reaching out with an expression of alarm. _She knows. This woman, the librarian, she knows—_

“Harrow!” The voice rises above a library murmur to call after her, but she is already stumbling out the door. She won’t be able to come back to this library, she’ll have to go to the one in the next town. She might have to transfer schools—no, it’s already the spring semester of her senior year, is that even possible? Maybe nothing will happen. There was that close call with Silas Octakiseron back at the beginning of the year, and despite her fears, her sleepless, sweaty nights waiting for the hammer to drop, nothing came of it. Maybe it will be all right. Maybe the librarian will keep her mouth shut, grant Harrow that undeserved mercy.

She is wholly consumed by this maelstrom of thoughts. The world coalesces into flashes, the icy burn of panting breaths in her throat and chest, her shoes beating against unyielding asphalt. Twice, she is startled from her swirl of panic by screeching tires and the blare of car horns. Even so, it is only when she sees Aiglamene’s face, creased with worry as she opens the door for her, that she comes back to herself. She doesn’t know how much time has passed. She has walked all the way home. 

It takes another hour for her to stop shaking. She explains to Aiglamene, in stumbling words, and permits it when Aiglamene gathers her in her arms and holds her, petting her face and head. 

“You listen to me, child,” Aiglamene says fiercely. “Nothing will happen to you, I won’t let it. Nobody will hurt you. If anybody tries, if anybody lays a single finger on you, I’ll kill them. Do you hear me? You’re safe.”

Inexplicably, Harrow thinks of another pair of strong arms, and how, at her most vulnerable, rather than causing her harm, they cradled her and conveyed her to safety. At this, finally, her tremors subside.

The next day, she returns to the library. Aiglamene insists on accompanying her, scruffy lioness that she is, but Harrow makes her wait outside. She will face this by herself.

The air-conditioned draft that wafts through the automatic doors is bracing. She walks directly up to the counter, fists clenched, and the woman behind the desk turns and makes eye contact. 

“Harrowhark! I’m glad you’re here, dear. I do apologize, it wasn't my intention to upset you yesterd—”

“The book,” Harrow blurts. 

“I’m sorry?”

“The book,” she says, over the ringing in her ears. “If you still have it. I’d like that book, please.”

She stares the librarian down, bracing herself, willing her to say something, to react somehow. The librarian’s expression, a picture of sincere remorse, softens into a smile.

“Of course, sweetheart.”


	7. Love Nest

The year is rushing headlong toward its denouement, and finals are bearing down upon them. Teachers have stopped hinting at the prospect of studying and started assigning hefty cumulative reviews. In the air, the breezy, pleasant denial of early spring has turned to the sour beginnings of exam stress.

“Hey, Harrow.” Gideon slouches against her desk. Harrow tilts her head a fraction in her direction. “Have you started studying yet?”

“Obviously.”

“Well, duh,” Gideon says, slapping her palm theatrically against her face. “It’s like I forget I’m talking to the biggest, nunniest nerd in the state. Maybe in the country.”

Harrow sighs. “What do you want, Nav?”

They both know full well what Gideon’s after. She doesn’t know why Harrow continues to humor her, in her prickly, reluctant way, but she supposes no one can resist the Gideon Nav charm for a whole year. True to form, Harrow grudgingly agrees to study with her.

“How much more harm can it do, at this point,” she says, resigned.

“Admit it, Nonagesimus.” Gideon gives her her best, most shit-eating grin, and flips her aviators down from her hair for maximum suave douchebaggery. “You are not immune to Navitis.”

“The school required my vaccination records when I enrolled, I’m not concerned,” says Harrow, turning the page of her review packet. Her barbs have lacked venom lately, or maybe Gideon has developed her own immunity. “Where do you propose we work? In case you forgot, we can no longer show our faces at the bookstore, and you’re much too loud for the delicate sensibilities of a library.”

Gideon hesitates. “We can do it at my house? If you’re okay with it?”

The surprise is evident on Harrow’s sharp little face. “You’re comfortable with—your parents, it’s fine with them?”

“Yeah,” says Gideon, trying to exude more confidence than she feels. “They’re actually starting to think my friends are imaginary, so I should probably get at least one of you to make an appearance, they know I’m too broke to hire an actor.”

An unfamiliar expression crossed Harrow’s face around _my friends are imaginary,_ probably some new, yet-undiscovered form of contempt. Scientists will be thrilled.

“All right,” is all she says. “Your address?”

* * *

Before inviting Harrow over, Gideon made an earnest attempt to clean up, taking her sweaty workout clothes to the laundry room and tidying the detritus on her floor and desk. Despite this, she is weirdly jittery about having someone new in the house, and even more self-conscious when prim, fastidious Harrow steps into her room and looks around. She suspects Harrow is similarly discomfited, if the way she keeps shifting from one foot to the other is any indication.

“Welcome to the love nest,” Gideon says, promptly wishing she hadn’t.

When Magnus and Abigail were first approved as her foster parents, they took her to the local Swedish home goods megastore, bought her a meatball lunch in the food court, and had her pick out her own furniture and linens. The following weekend, they surprised her with tins of paint that complemented her sheets. The three of them spent a peaceful, paint-fumed afternoon turning the white walls a dark, soothing blue-grey.

Since then, the room has steadily filled with band posters, assorted exercise equipment, and pictures of her friends, including a blurry selfie, half-hidden behind a strand of twinkle lights, of herself and a scowling Harrow at the coffee shop. She debated whether to take that one down—isn’t entirely sure Harrow knows it exists—but decided in the end that hiding it was probably creepier than not.

“It’s nice,” Harrow says, surprising them both. “I expected something more … tawdry.”

“And you were right as usual, my dear Holmes!” Gideon crows, unable to resist. She whips open her closet door to reveal her collection of magazine pin-ups.

Harrow merely shakes her head and perches at Gideon’s desk. “Let’s get on with it.”

By now, they have spent enough time in each other’s company that the discomfort quickly falls away and their familiar dynamic resumes. They make a decent start on some of their study guides and become so engrossed in squabbling over a question, they don’t hear the front door, or the footsteps until they’re right outside the room.

Magnus pokes his head in. “Gideon!”

Gideon jumps a mile. “Jesus—”

“It's Magnus, actually.” He guffaws at his own joke. “I see you have a guest! Might this be the Harrow you’ve told us so much about?”

Next to her, Harrow has gone surly with what Gideon can now read as nerves, hopefully distracting her from what Magnus just said. Gideon makes hasty introductions, and Harrow stands and stiffly shakes his hand.

“So nice to put a face to the name!” Magnus beams. “Every day, it’s Harrow this, Harrow that, we were wondering when we’d finally get to meet you. Oh, but—” he frowns. “Abigail isn’t home yet, is she, Gid? How long are you staying, Harrow?”

“Apologies, I should be going,” Harrow says, glancing at the time on her phone. “I’m expected home for dinner.”

“That’s too bad.” Magnus appears to be mourning the lost opportunity to embarrass Gideon further. “You’ll have to stay for dinner some other time, Gid’s mother is an excellent cook. Can we expect to see you again soon?”

Harrow looks like she’s warring with the desire to curl into her many-layered shell of cardigans. Gideon jumps in, with a sense that she’s capitulating to her doom. “Yeah, we’re studying for finals together, so she’ll be here … uh, every day?” The prospect is sounding less appealing by the second, but Harrow gives a mute nod.

“Excellent! I’ll let Abby know to expect a guest for dinner one of these days.” He shoots Gideon a conspiratorial wink and wanders back down the hall, humming to himself.

She and Harrow stare at each other in mutual horror for a moment. Then, that strange look from earlier comes over Harrow’s face again. “You talk about me with your parents?”

“Don’t you have to go home?” Gideon says wildly, shoving Harrow’s books into her arms and ushering her bodily from the room.

* * *

To Gideon’s relief, Magnus relents on embarrassing her into a hole in the ground. She and Harrow, left to their own devices, make good progress on their studying. Harrow gets comfortable in the cave of Gideon’s room, forsaking the desk after a few days to curl up in a bean bag chair, more relaxed than Gideon has seen her thus far. For her part, Gideon sprawls out on her bed with their books and notes like some kind of nerdy dragon with its papery hoard.

For the first time, it’s almost like they’re hanging out—surrounded by schoolwork, yes, but sometimes Gideon will grab them a snack from the kitchen, and they’ll shoot the shit for a few minutes before getting back to it. Once or twice, they finish their food and Harrow doesn’t even jump back in right away, content to keep up the banter with her legs dangling out of the bean bag and an empty wrapper clutched loosely in her hand.

It is just such a laid-back scene that Abigail encounters when she peeks in, a few days before their exams.

“Good afternoon,” she says brightly. “Gideon, and Harrowhark, too, it’s nice to see you!”

Gideon lifts her head from her study guide. “Hi, Abigail!” When Harrow is silent, Gideon turns to look at her.

She is sitting very straight, somewhat of a feat in her squashy chair, and wearing an inscrutable expression. “You’re the librarian.”

“Yes, I—” Abigail appears faintly confused. “I apologize, did I not say that Gideon is my daughter?”

“You two know each other?” Gideon says.

“Harrowhark comes into the library all the time, sweetheart, you could take a page out of her book,” Abigail teases. “I haven’t seen you in a few weeks, dear, is everything all right?”

Harrow seems to go through several emotions before deciding on a kind of nervous acceptance. “Yes, everything is fine. I finished the final presentation for my independent study course early.”

“Wonderful!” says Abigail. “You’re in the home stretch of your studying, aren’t you? Won’t you stay for dinner, to congratulate you both on your hard work?”

Gideon is following very little of this conversation, but she has long accepted this as one of the hazards of spending any amount of time around Harrow. The feeling only intensifies when Harrow nods formally and says, “Yes, thank you, I think I will.”

For dinner, Abigail whips up one of Gideon’s favorites, a mouthwatering, golden rice dish with minced meat, green beans, and herbs. She sets down a lighter-colored portion in front of Harrow. “Gideon let me know that you prefer a milder flavor profile,” she says lightly. “I hope it’s to your liking.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Gideon can see Harrow turn in her direction, and she pointedly does not look at her, saying loudly, “Wow, Abigail, this looks great! Have some respect, guys, less talking, more eating!” Across the table, Magnus smothers a laugh.

As they dig in, Gideon chances a sidelong peek at Harrow, who is chewing with thoughtful enjoyment. She is filled with a sudden warmth in her core, which is due, of course, to the food.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _[Rice dish (lubia polo)](https://www.google.com/search?q=lubia+polo) _


	8. Giving Up the Pretense

Though Harrow doesn’t have much standard for comparison, her final exams go more smoothly than she anticipated. Maybe there’s something to the rubber duck method, if the rubber duck were not a rubber duck, but instead a mildly obnoxious girl with overly friendly parents. The rubber duck also seems to have an easier time of it than expected, if her meandering exam postmortems are anything to go by.

They emerge from the dank pit of their last exam into a beautiful, sunny day. Harrow allows herself the brief pleasure of tilting her face up to the sky, eyes closed, to feel the sun on her skin.

“So, Nonagesimus, you going to prom?” says Gideon, stretching as they cross the courtyard.

It’s such a nice day, she can’t find it within herself to be annoyed at the twenty questions routine. “No.”

“Would you want to? Go? To prom, I mean? Um, with me?”

Harrow bristles, then, at the mockery, but when she looks up at Gideon, the retort dies on her tongue. Gideon’s eyes dart between hers. There’s a weird twist to her mouth, like she’s uncomfortable, or—not uncomfortable. Nervous?

Heat rises to Harrow’s face. Something does a funny little pirouette in her chest. She stares at Gideon’s face, which is trying and failing to be casual—her messy hair, garishly orange against the blue of the sky; her skin turned golden brown in the sunlight; her eyes, those irritating, shining, pretty—

“Okay,” her idiot mouth says, before she can stop it. The flush climbs to a throb that she feels to the tips of her ears. She must look like a tomato.

“Okay?” repeats Gideon. She says it very quickly, like she’s out of breath, though they’ve stopped walking. People flow past them, chattering, oddly muted.

“Okay. I’ll go to prom.” What on earth is she doing? “With you.”

“Okay,” says Gideon, again. Her mouth is hanging open a little. Harrow wants to shove her, wants to shake the dumb look off her face, wants—something else, maybe.

This facsimile of a thought is driven from her mind when Gideon wraps her big, warm arms around her and lifts her off the ground, grin huge and brilliant on her face. Harrow’s shriek of protest goes unacknowledged, and she thrashes to get away as Gideon laughs. She tries not to feel the heat of Gideon’s body enveloping hers, the strange pang behind her ribcage when Gideon’s eyes glow like molten gold in the afternoon sun.

“We’re going to prom!” Gideon shouts, almost directly into her ear. She barely hears it over the thundering of her pulse.

Someone yells back across the courtyard, “Good for you!”

* * *

Things are odd, between them, after that.

Harrow finds herself almost physically unable to look Gideon in the eyes. When she forces herself, a jolt like an electric shock runs through her. It isn’t altogether unpleasant.

Gideon is her same irritating, garrulous self, but not, because she trips over her words and sometimes loses her train of thought altogether if she realizes Harrow is actually paying attention. This is, of course, incredibly annoying, except—to Harrow’s horror—it’s not, it’s _charming_.

Their classes have devolved into pointless end-of-year personal projects about where they see themselves in the future and other such rubbish. One teacher gives up the pretense entirely and starts showing movies. On day three of _Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,_ Gideon links two of her fingers through Harrow’s under their shared table, and all of her brain power redirects to those tiny points of contact. She has no idea how the movie ends. When the lights come back on, they let go and walk to their next class in embarrassed silence, side by side, arms brushing.

As can be expected, Gideon’s friends know about the promposal before they get the chance to tell them.

“It’s about time!” Dulcie coos. “We made bets ages ago on how long it would take you two to figure it out.”

“We owe Cam fifty dollars each,” gripes Palamedes. “The number went up based on how far off we were.”

Camilla chews her food placidly, betrayed only by the hint of a smirk. Gideon buries her face in her hands. Harrow wishes fervently to un-know all these people.

“Well, now that you have your noses in all of our business,” Harrow says. “What exactly is going on with you three?”

“Oh, you have us all figured out, don’t you?” cries Dulcie. She is positively effervescent with delight. “I knew you would catch on, clever girl. Yes, I have two prom dates! Aren’t I lucky?” She links one arm through Camilla’s and throws the other around Palamedes’s shoulders.

“For the record,” says Camilla. “Sextus and I are not also seeing each other.” Palamedes snickers.

“Wha—” Gideon gapes. “Congrats, guys! How long has this been going on?”

“Hmm … a while.” Dulcie waves a hand airily. “I don’t know about putting a timeline on it.”

“A few months, I’d say. Not all of us are quite so obvious.”

“Oh, _you’re_ one to talk, Sex Pal—”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“I’m sure you know exactly what I mean—”

As Harrow half-listens to Gideon bickering with Palamedes, the newly undisguised fondness is replaced by an old, familiar dread pooling in her stomach. There is only so much longer that she can keep her festering darkness caged, but she’s not ready to release it into the world. Not yet. She wants to hang onto this, this tenuous new something, as long as she can.

* * *

On the Friday before prom, Gideon catches up with Harrow at her locker.

“Hey, Harrow,” she says in a mild panic. Immediately, Harrow’s anxiety levels peak.

Today has been particularly unbearable. As prom draws nearer, Harrow has awaited with increasing dread the moment that Gideon realizes she’s made an enormous mistake, drops the hand she continues to reach for secretly under the desk, and runs to ask Coronabeth Tridentarius to be her date instead. The moment has finally come—later than she expected, but no earlier than she deserves. She braces for the blow.

“I completely forgot, everyone is coordinating their outfits with their—” Gideon’s voice cracks, and she has to take a second to cough. “—their dates. What color is your dress? Or, or, your outfit, whatever you’re wearing, my suit is just black, but I can try and find a matching tie today or tomorrow, if you—”

A wave of relief washes over Harrow, so powerful she’s slightly dizzy with it. In a trance, she stretches out her hand and catches the arm Gideon is flailing through the air. Gideon freezes mid-word.

“That’s perfect.” Her voice sounds distant, and calmer than she is.

“Oh. Okay,” Gideon sputters. “And, um—” she lowers her arm, carefully freeing it from Harrow’s grasp, and takes her hand instead. “I’d, uh, like to pick you up. Before prom, I mean. If that’s okay?”

Harrow nods her oddly weightless head like a bobbing balloon. “Yes, I’d like that.”

“Cool.” Gideon squeezes her hand and, unable to suppress it, smiles lopsidedly at her.


	9. Haunted

The drive to Harrow’s house fills Gideon with a sense of vague foreboding. As her shitty sedan struggles up the hill in the evening gloom, the houses passing her window increase in size and distance apart. Harrow lives right at the summit, overlooking a treacherous valley that must become a heinous black pit at night, which, go figure.

She pulls up to the gate, boggling at the scale of Harrow's house. Some might describe it as an _elegant Victorian estate,_ but she knows from years of the finest of B-cinema that this is a _bona fide haunted-ass mansion_. It looks oddly familiar; maybe they do actually use it to shoot horror movies. Thanks to that run-in with Silas so many eons ago, she figured Harrow was rich, but this has her wondering why she’s slumming it at a public high school instead of at some snooty all-girls private school run by nuns. Maybe the uniforms weren’t conservative enough.

The elaborately scrolled front gate is unlocked. As she mounts the steps to the house, a woman with leathery skin and a scowl cracks the door. She looks nothing like Harrow.

“Good evening, um, ma’am, I—”

“Yes, yes, you’re Harrowhark’s prom date.” The woman opens the door a fraction more with obvious reluctance, rocking back onto her prosthetic leg with a _thunk_. “She can take care of herself, as I’m sure you very well know, so I won’t bother with the shotgun talk—”

“You’re embarrassing me, Aiglamene,” says a voice from behind her. Harrow emerges, giving the woman a wry, affectionate look that Gideon has never seen before, and Gideon’s mouth goes dry.

Harrow is in black lace from top to toe, like she’s about to attend a funeral for whatever poor sucker is haunting her house. Predictable, of the church girl, to cover up _more_ in her prom dress—which doesn’t explain why Gideon’s heart is pounding at the peeks of décolletage and arm through the lace, the cling of fabric from neck to hip, where it swoops out into floaty layers of skirts. Delicate silver things drip from Harrow’s throat and wrists and glitter from her fingers. Her chin-length hair, pinned half-up in a crown of braids, cascades into soft curls, and she’s wearing _makeup,_ which she must have just learned existed: elegant wings of eyeliner, her skin smoother and more glowy than usual, and something dark and velvety on her lips. She looks taller, somehow, and Gideon realizes she’s swaying a little in heels.

She looks like a vengeful ghost; she looks like a goddess.

Gideon wrangles the mush that was formerly her mouth into words. “Hi! Harrow. Hi, hey. You look beautif—you look nice.” Nailed it.

Luckily for her, Harrow doesn’t seem to have noticed the lapse in her linguistic capabilities, because there’s that lovely pink flush Gideon never tires of seeing. Harrow’s eyes linger over her carefully moussed hair and the thrifted tailcoat Isaac helped her tailor to hug her shoulders and nip in at her waist.

“You look—nice, too,” Harrow manages. Gideon’s knees do not wobble, not even a bit.

“Shall we, my funereal temptress?” She offers her arm, and tries not to vibrate out of her skin when Harrow slips one small, black-polished hand into the crook of her elbow.

Aiglamene makes them pause on the porch for pictures, but it’s over mercifully quickly, and she waves them off with a gruff “Have fun. Not too much fun.” Gideon helps Harrow teeter down the steps to her car, which looks especially shabby awaiting its regal passenger. She opens Harrow’s door for her and promptly ruins the gesture by bowing and waving her in with a ludicrous flourish; Harrow climbs in with surprising grace. Gideon hates that she feels something at the sight of layers of tulle lifting to expose Harrow’s slim ankle.

As Gideon buckles herself in, she says, “Aiglamene …?”

“My adoptive mother.” Harrow does not elaborate.

“I didn’t know you were adopted,” says Gideon stupidly, and is grateful when Harrow doesn’t remark on it. She risks a glance sideways; Harrow is shooting her a long-suffering look, but there’s no real feeling behind it, and in any case, the effect is utterly diminished by how pretty she looks. God, she’s stunning, the makeup turning her narrow eyes into glittering voids—Gideon feels herself being sucked in, and is faintly aware that she has been sitting here, staring, for too long—she clears her throat and fumbles to start the car.

As they near the bottom of the hill, Harrow says, as if there was no break in the conversation, “She was excited when I told her I was going to prom, she’s always trying to convince me to do _normal kid shit.”_

Huh.

Ignoring the startling and slightly arousing sound of Harrow swearing, it’s not Harrow’s parents (parent?), then, who are pressuring their daughter into modern nunhood. Even Gideon has enough brain cells to decide against this particular course of conversation. Instead, she says, “She didn’t seem too excited to see me, if she wanted you to go to prom.”

Harrow hums noncommittally. “That’s just how she is.” Gideon looks at her out of the corner of her eye, and is treated again to that new expression: soft, not quite a smile. At this rate, Gideon will have used up all of her Harrow reward points before they even get to the dance.

* * *

Prom is being held at a site in the historic district, a grand, white mansion “in the Italianate style,” according to the website. Its square tower and flat roofs jut out over stately, arch-headed windows, a decadent wraparound porch, and a sprawling garden, softly illuminated with hanging lanterns. It’s a far cry nicer than the fairy light-strewn gym that hosts their other school dances. It’s also, Gideon does not fail to notice, not that much larger than Harrow’s house.

Gideon helps Harrow out of the car and turns it into an excuse to hold her hand. Harrow curls her fingers into Gideon’s, face going pink again.

After checking in with a teacher they don't recognize, thankfully avoiding the need to make awkward conversation outside of school, they follow the stream of people through a towering double doorway into an enormous, high-ceilinged room. A DJ bobs behind their equipment on a stage at the far end of the room, and music thumps from speakers dotted around the space. Even through the crowd of familiar faces gussied up to the point of unrecognizability, Coronabeth is immediately conspicuous, glowing next to a dessert-covered table.

“Let’s go say hi,” Gideon suggests. Harrow tensed upon entering the room and currently looks like she regrets all of her choices leading up to this moment, but she gives a curt nod. Gideon leads her by the hand through the throngs of people.

“Gideon! Don’t you look dashing?” Coronabeth exclaims. Up close, she is almost blinding, golden and sparkling under the glittering crystals of her prom queen’s crown. Her beauty is only amplified by the simplicity of her silky, plum-colored gown, with its high slit revealing the length of one toned leg. Her glossy mouth drops open as she recognizes Gideon’s date. “And Harrow, wow! You look beautiful!”

Harrow stammers a thank-you, looking somehow even more ill at ease with the positive attention. Gideon is starting to feel like she’s torturing her. She passes her eye over the table and seizes the plainest-looking pastry she can find, passing it to Harrow like a kind of pacifier. Harrow lets go of her hand to take it without seeming to register it.

“You look amazing, Corona,” says Gideon. “What’s with the flowers everyone is wearing, did we miss something?”

Corona looks at the beribboned cluster of orchids on her wrist as if seeing it for the first time. “Oh! Well, corsages and boutonnieres are—traditional, but they’re not _mandatory.…”_

“Oops, missed the memo on that one,” Gideon laughs, hoping that Harrow will find the faux pas amusing rather than annoying, but her look of consternation is starting to verge on panic. “Hey, Harrow, it’s no big deal, I doubt anyone’s going to notice—” She casts around for a safer subject. “So, who are you here with, Corona?”

“Oh, we're here with a group,” she says indistinctly. “Have you seen Ianthe and Babs? They seem to have disappeared on me.…”

“No, sorry, we just got here.” Gideon joins her in craning to peer through the crowd, but to no success. After about a minute of this, they give it up.

“Whatever,” says Corona in an attempt at dismissiveness. “I’m prom queen, I don’t need them! I’m going to go dance! Will you and Harrow—say, where is Harrow?”

They’ve been here for all of twenty minutes, and already Gideon’s managed to embarrass her in front of the prom queen and scare her off entirely. Feeling like an utter churl, she bids Corona a hasty adieu and plunges into the crowd, asking anyone she recognizes if they’ve seen her. “Small and pointy, looks like a goth princess, you know the one, no flowers because her date is a clown—”

At last, a kid they share some classes with says they think they saw her heading for the bathrooms and points Gideon to the back of the house. As Gideon is about to commit a serious violation of the girl code by barging past the already-long line into the bathroom, she spots the swimming pool out back and the tiny, familiar shape at its rim. She pushes through the glass doors instead and descends into the back garden.

* * *

There are a few people dotted here and there throughout the gardens, but most people are inside, with the music and food and company; certainly, nobody else seems willing to risk their expensive outfits getting too close to the pool. Harrow sits alone at the edge, skirts hiked up to her thighs and shoes tucked neatly behind her, bare feet dipped in the water. Gideon is cautious as she approaches, coming to stand diagonally behind her, unsure of the exact nature of what she’s done wrong.

“I was … overwhelmed,” Harrow says, and it takes Gideon a few seconds to realize she is apologizing.

“That’s okay,” she says carefully, lowering herself to sit cross-legged beside Harrow.

“I am unaccustomed to— _normal kid shit,_ as Aiglamene would put it.” The word _shit_ continues to have no business sounding sexy in Harrow’s high, cold voice, which is not so cold as lukewarm and hesitant, at the moment.

“Yeah, I get it.” Should she, like, put an arm around her, or something? Harrow’s shoulders are very small, and she is sitting very close. The moment feels oddly intimate without a piece of furniture and a pile of schoolwork between them. Gideon kind of wants to put her arm around her. She doesn’t.

“No, I don’t think you do,” says Harrow, not unkindly. She appears to be wrestling with something, all by herself. “I think—I think I would like to tell you the truth, about me. I want you to know the truth. Will you hear it?”

“Yeah, of course,” Gideon says without hesitation. “Go for it.”

The light from the pool casts blue-green ripples across Harrow’s face. The sound of the party is muffled; water laps in whispers against the sides of the pool. Harrow takes a breath in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Prom location[inspiration](https://www.instagram.com/p/CLaWXPnHMzD/)_


	10. The Truth of You

“What do you know,” she begins, “about the Temple of the Nine Houses?”

The name is vaguely familiar. “Was it in the news, or something? Like, when we were younger?”

“Yes, it would have been.” Harrow’s face is unreadable, her eyes fixed on the water.

“The Temple of the Nine Houses was a church founded by a man named John Gaius, who proclaimed himself to be God in the guise of a man. His followers, the Canaanites, worshipped him as their lord and emperor. They were devoted to him—the most dedicated carried out violent acts of faith in his name. To the Canaanites, they were saints, their lyctors; to the rest of the world, they were terrorists.”

Indistinct images emerge in Gideon’s mind: smoke and flames, people running, the solemn face of a news reporter. Pixelated people-shapes splotched with dark red, unmoving.

“He told his followers he had magic. He told them he could raise the dead. When federal law enforcement was closing in, he ordered the Canaanites to ascend through suicide. Non-believers would perish by the power of their sacrifice, the faithful would be resurrected, and they would rule the solar system as the next evolution of humanity.”

Dots begin to form terrible connections.

“I was raised in the Temple of the Nine Houses.”

Gideon’s blood runs cold.

“When my parents took their lives, I should have gone with them. I was meant to—I don’t know how much time passed before Aiglamene found me, still standing on the chair with the rope around my neck, next to the bodies of my parents and their bodyguard. I was afraid. I was too _cowardly_ to kick the chair away when they did. So I watched them die, and they watched me commit heresy. They watched me betray them with their last breaths.”

Gideon realizes, in a nauseating surge, how she knows Harrow’s house. It was in those newscasts, roped off with flapping, yellow caution tape, a backdrop to assorted dour-faced local news anchors. _Wealthy local family,_ they’d said, attempting to mask their glee about cult goings-on in their very own town. _Police calling it a brutal triple suicide. Found by their nine-year-old daughter._

“God, Harrow—”

Harrow holds up a hand. Her eyes are dry, but her chest is heaving. She sucks in a great gulp of air and continues.

“Aiglamene is my godmother—she refused to keep homeschooling me this year, she’s always telling me, _Live your damn life, do normal kid shit, your fool parents were in a damn cult and they were brainwashed, they didn’t know what they were doing_ —but they knew that I betrayed them. That was the last thing they ever saw. So, I—I studied the _Canaan_ and the _Mithraeum,_ and even after I realized they were bullshit, even after all my research on new religious movements and doomsday cults and charismatic authority—I live in penance, as if in doing so, I can make up for my betrayal: to my family, for not being faithful enough, and to society, for having been so at all.

“Now, you know. Against my better judgement, you have become my friend. My only friend. You have wormed your way into my rotten heart, and it is yours to discard, now that you know the truth of it.” Harrow’s eyes are no longer dry, but terribly bright. She has not looked at Gideon since she began to explain, and now she faces her, jaw set, eyes sparkling with unshed tears, and Gideon simply can _not—_

When Gideon pulls her into her arms and holds on tight, Harrow is rigid as death. Slowly, she goes limp in Gideon’s embrace, and begins to shake; she buries her face in Gideon’s collar, which grows warm and damp. Her hands come up to grasp at the back of Gideon’s coat. They sit there for a long time, letting Harrow cry herself out, with great, shuddering gasps, into Gideon’s shirt.

Finally, Harrow’s grip loosens a little, and she pulls back barely an inch. Her eyes are downcast, and she won’t meet Gideon’s eye until Gideon hooks a finger under her chin and tilts it up so they are face to face. Harrow’s skin is damp and feverishly hot when Gideon presses a kiss to the bridge of her nose, and she gives one last hiccup of a sob.

“I’m not discarding anything,” Gideon says softly. “My heart is yours, too. Loser.”

Harrow gives a watery, quavering laugh, and tucks her forehead against Gideon’s chest. Gideon runs her fingers through her hair and pets it, soothing.

Eventually, Harrow pulls away again, wiping her face with delicate motions, and they sit side by side. Gideon tugs off her shoes and socks, rolls up her pant legs, and dangles her feet in the water next to Harrow’s. They intertwine their fingers and sit there in companionable quiet.

Gideon breaks the silence. “Your makeup is still mostly on.”

Harrow laughs for real at that, her face tugging into a radiant smile, and Gideon’s heart might burst in her chest from the beauty of it. “I used setting spray,” she confesses. “I spent weeks watching makeup videos online after you asked me to prom.”

“You’re pretty cute, for a weird cultist.” The idea of Harrow practicing her makeup in a mirror with clumsy fingers, trying to look nice for Gideon, gives her palpitations. Harrow shoves at her shoulder and laughs again. Not out of Harrow reward points yet, then.

“It was the first time I thought … that I could take something for myself, that I could be allowed something good.” Gideon can’t help squeezing her hand, and she squeezes back.

“You deserve everything good,” says Gideon, meaning it, and Harrow leans against her side and lays her head on her shoulder. Gideon clutches her hand, heart in her throat, and doesn’t say, _You are everything good._

* * *

They do end up dancing, Harrow clumsy and awkward, throwing herself into it with a fervor that is almost angry. She obviously knows none of the songs, and her sense of rhythm is appalling. Gideon, watching her determined movements, is giddy with affection.

On one of their turns about the room, they run into Camilla and Dulcinea. Cam is bronzed and striking in a sleek French twist, fitted grey suit, and pointed heels, with an aqua-colored tie to match Dulcie’s flowing, crepey gown. Dulcie is a picture of loveliness, loose curls tumbling from a messy bun to frame her face, her normally pallid cheeks flushed with happiness. They’re both shiny with sweat and smiling from ear to ear.

The song ends, so they all take a moment to sit and catch their breath, chatting about nothing in particular and watching their classmates dance by. After a few minutes, Palamedes appears, dapper with his dark hair slicked back and a fitted waistcoat, and lays a kiss atop Dulcie’s head.

“Mom says it’s my turn with the pretty girlfriend,” he deadpans. Camilla laughs and hands Dulcie off to him, snagging the remainder of her snack plate.

“Are you guys having fun?” she asks, biting a chocolate biscuit in half.

Before Gideon can open her mouth, Harrow says, “Yes. The most fun I’ve ever had.” And she smiles at Gideon, who feels her soul leave her body.

“Gay,” says Camilla.

* * *

It’s late when Gideon pulls up to Harrow’s house to drop her off. After the dance, they met up with Cam, Pal, and Dulcie at a shitty all-night diner and stuffed themselves full of gloriously greasy food (Harrow had plain pancakes and eggs). They talked with steadily decreasing coherence into the wee hours of the morning, until Dulcinea straight-up fell asleep on Pal’s shoulder, at which point they called it a night.

The canyon in front of Harrow’s place is indeed a hell pit of nightmares at this time. Gideon says so, and Harrow laughs, actually laughs. They sit and look at each other, bleary with the lateness of the hour, abuzz with the exhilaration of one of the happiest nights Gideon can remember. Then, Harrow is unbuckling her seatbelt, leaning across the center console, taking Gideon’s face in her tiny hands, and—

_Oh._

So.

This is what they write songs about.

After minutes, or maybe years, of soft lips and warm breath and the heat of Harrow’s body against hers, they part. She watches the dreamy smile on Harrow’s lips and thinks that she could die, right now, filled with this bright feeling like fizzing bubbles, and she would welcome it.

“Thank you, Gideon,” Harrow whispers.

It is a glimmering shard of time, a moonlit prism, fragile and perfect. Gideon tucks her face into Harrow's soft hair and holds her close. 


	11. Epilogue

10 Years Later

After everything that has happened, Corona has some trepidation about attending her high school reunion. She keeps the invitation open in a tab for weeks, going back and forth, until finally, one night, she polishes off the last drops of wine in her glass and RSVPs “Yes.” Ten years is a long time, surely long enough that any ruffled feathers will be smoothed back down by now.

She waffles for a while about what to wear before settling on what she deems her introduce-a-candidate outfit: snappy blazer, a top cut just low enough, and heeled ankle boots, though she swaps the demure dark jeans for tight leather pants. She throws some bits and bobs of gold and amethyst on top, because she is still cute, single, and in her 20’s, after all.

The high school has not changed significantly since Corona last stepped foot in it as a student. On the drive in, she notices that the portable classrooms have been replaced with a sleek, new building, slightly at odds with the rest of the campus, but that’s about it. Same lunch tables arrayed at the entrance to each wing, same well-pruned suburban greenery, same banners for various local businesses on the fences surrounding the athletics field.

She signs her name at the gate and follows the signage to an assembly room whose entrance is festooned with a balloon arch and string lights. As she walks in, she feels an unexpected burst of excitement at the familiar-yet-unfamiliar faces. Thankless as the daily slog of an activist can be, it has only bolstered her enthusiasm for the little things. She tells herself this even as she is forced, in quick succession, to pretend she remembers several acquaintances who have long drifted out of the peripheries of her memory.

She’s just wrapping up a conversation when she spots an unmistakable head of fiery orange hair coming through the door—and, to her delight, a much smaller, nigh-unrecognizable figure in unrelenting black next to her.

“Gideon! Harrow!”

“Corona!” Gideon calls back, breaking into a grin.

As they draw closer, Corona notes with approval that Gideon’s twenties have been good to her. Her asymmetrical smile has only become more captivating with the years. She looks hale, even bigger than she was in school, if that’s possible—her collared shirt stretches in an intriguing way across her frame, and its sleeves are rolled up to reveal strong, brown forearms. The wild, almost desperate bravado she put on in her teens has smoothed into a calm sense of assurance, though the air of charming cockiness is still there.

“Hello, Coronabeth,” says Harrow. This is the first time Corona has seen her smile, and she briefly observes that it’s _adorable,_ before her eyes catch on the dainty hand slung casually through the crook of Gideon’s arm. Something sparkles from her ring finger.

“You got married?” Corona exclaims.

“Just last year,” says Gideon, grinning. She takes her hand out of her pocket to wiggle her own ring at Corona. “She said no the first time.”

“I wasn’t going to be the church girl who married her jock girlfriend right out of high school,” Harrow sniffs.

Indeed, the church girl has vanished without a trace. Gone are the sack-like cardigans and dowdy skirts that wore her as much as she wore them—she is a woman transformed, a sleek, vulpine creature, dressed simply, but with a distinct sense of style. She, too, carries herself now like someone who knows where she belongs in the world.

The confident, worldly women are currently bickering in front of Corona.

“After college wasn’t _right out of high school,_ Nonagesimus—”

“We were infants _,_ Griddle—”

“You also said no the second time—”

“How were we going to get married from opposite sides of the _world—”_

“It was about the intention—anyway, third time’s the charm,” finishes Gideon, as her wife takes a breath to continue arguing. Harrow shoots her one of those familiar, deadly looks, causing a wave of nostalgia to break over Corona, but it’s tempered by something soft and affectionate now.

“Opposite sides of the world!” Corona says. “Well, I must know more!”

They’re more than happy to oblige, jostling to brag about each other’s accomplishments. It’s sickeningly sweet.

Harrow went to a fancy private university right out of high school, while Gideon opted for community college to save on funds. After obtaining her associate’s degree and “a lot of wrinkles about student loan debt,” Gideon transferred to Harrow’s school and moved in with her, only to discover that her tuition had been paid by an anonymous benefactor.

“It was obviously her, I don’t know why she bothered trying to hide it.”

Harrow rolls her eyes. “Because you were such a stubborn ass about it the one time I suggested that—”

“—didn’t want you to be my sugar mommy—”

“What the hell else was I going to do with the money, start a cult? And need I remind you, I’m ten months younger than you—”

After college, Gideon started working full-time at her old kendo school (“the one on Fifth, it’s kinda becoming a family business”) and picked up her competitive career where she left off in high school. Harrow adds with a touch of smugness that she is globally ranked, a feat Gideon brushes off as “less impressive than it sounds, seriously, I went to Japan once and got my ass kicked almost immediately.”

Harrow wrote her memoir while getting her master’s, Gideon boasts, because it was too small-brain to do one at a time, and embarked on an international book tour for _One Flesh, One End: The Rise and Fall of the Nine Houses Cult, A Survivor’s True Account, With Foreword by Pyrrha Dve_ shortly after graduating. Corona read it; it was very good, if a bit wordy. She was probably making up for lost time, given that Corona heard about two words total out of her mouth their entire senior year.

“She just landed a deal for a novel series,” Gideon says proudly. “I’ve seen the drafts, and all I have to say to the publishing world is, honey, you’ve got a big storm comin’. _And_ she’s about to start her Ph.D. program, because she’s insane.” She shoots her insane wife a look so fond, Corona feels like she should look away.

Harrow says, “Gideon may take over the dojo soon—”

 _“_ —temporarily, as the interim director—”

 _“—because_ her parents would like to travel, and once they see how much less of a hassle it is to have you run the business, you know Magnus will probably hand it over to you. Additionally, you said you were, and I quote, ‘over schlepping around the country for tournaments.’”

“Well, yeah,” Gideon admits. “Anyway, now that we’ve talked for, like, a year, how are you, Corona? What are you up to these days?”

Corona sighs. “Well, I’m sure you heard all about the scandal …”

“The cheating thing?” Gideon shifts uncomfortably. “I mean, obviously we don’t know the whole story, but yeah, I think most people heard.”

As soon as their freshman year of university began, Ianthe went straight to the admissions board and told them everything—how she had done most of Corona’s assignments since they were children, and about the system she created to help her sister cheat on exams, because heaven forbid that their parents have a daughter who wasn’t Gifted and Talented.

“It broke my heart,” Corona says tightly. After all this time, it still hurts to talk about. “And she jeopardized her own acceptance by doing that, but I think … she had had enough. I just wish things had gone differently.”

Her sister hasn’t spoken to her since. Ianthe, by then living in the school dorms, cut off the family completely. The last Corona heard, she’s now something of a shark on Wall Street.

“She has some kind of on-again, off-again hatemance with Babs, I think, he either works for her or at her firm, or something like that.”

“I never knew quite what to make of either of them,” Harrow says thoughtfully. “But that seems a logical progression of events.”

After Corona was expelled, she contemplated joining the military, but went abroad with a government volunteer program instead. She spent two years getting her hands dirty and learning how to be a real person off of her puppet strings, and upon her return, dove headlong into the world of activism.

“Of course, that was when I learned about the neocolonialism of international volunteering, but there’s no undoing the past.” Harrow nods in understanding, while Gideon gives her the same polite smile she used to give teachers who asked if she had done the reading.

Since then, Corona has mostly kept busy as a community organizer, with a little picketing, some hassling of elected officials, and a few arrests for civil disobedience on the side, but who’s counting. She’s starting to think about running for local office.

At this, Gideon’s glassy eyes brighten. “You’ve got my vote!”

“Beloved, I don’t think Coronabeth lives here anymore,” says Harrow, the corner of her dark lips quirking.

“Oh,” says Gideon, unembarrassed. “Well, if you did, you’d get my vote.”

This wholehearted geniality is so achingly, charmingly familiar, it makes a lump rise in Corona’s throat. She smiles around it and says, full of feeling, “I’m so glad I got to see you two.”

They smile back, and—the evening not done surprising her yet—both reach out to give her a hug.

* * *

Back in her hotel room, she kicks her boots off her aching feet and flops down on the covers of the bed to check her notifications. She scrolls idly past photo tags, friend requests, and “Good to see you” messages before her eye catches on an alert from a community fund she co-manages. It’s a donation, a sizable one, from one Harrowhark Nonagesimus. The attached message instructs her to “Keep saving the world!!” and is signed, “Your Friends, Gideon & Harrow.”

She smiles and says aloud, to the emptiness of her room, “Maybe I will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hint: You may want to stay tuned! If you’d like, I suggest subscribing to [my profile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/influorescence/pseuds/influorescence) or [the series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/2170755), but no pressure. 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and a special thank you to those of you who followed this chapter by chapter and those of you who commented! This is my longest piece of creative writing … ever, actually. It means a lot that people enjoyed this story. Much love.

**Author's Note:**

> Art and thoughts on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/jademaomi).


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